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Sean McCarty

BIOGRAPHY

Hey, my name is Sean. I'm from Columbia, IL. It's roughly ten minutes from South County, St. Louis, MO. I'm a new freshman here at UIUC studying chemistry with a pre-medicine focus. Through out high school I ran track and went to state senior year in the 800m dash. I still participate in the Track Club here at UIUC. I'm very excited about the next four years and especially for this summer!

PERSONAL STATEMENT

While I haven’t had a direct family member have cancer, I still have experience with cancer. My great grandma had cancer, my grandma had cancer, and my grandpa had cancer. As my grandma is getting older, I continually hear about a lot of her friends and family members are also discovering that they have cancer. I worked for an older gentleman and I often heard him talking to his wife about how their friends have cancer and he had to get some skin cancer removed. I also have friends who have parents who have been affected by cancer or have been lost to cancer. Even though it hasn’t affected me directly, I feel that we’re getting to the point where I can almost guarantee that it will at some point in my life. I feel like people no longer die from old age, the die from cancer before age is able to get to them. It is to the point where it is basically a plague and I believe that we all have a part to play in fighting it. There is a possibility that it may be the biggest health problem of our generation and I have the ability to fight it in a truly unique and life changing way.